...

I'm around the halfway mark I think, the current room I'm stuck on requires either a wave / hyper (maybe even super) dash to reach a moving block to then wall bounce off said block and grab onto from the other side. Suffice to say I ended up stopping out of care for my wellbeing.

So begins my trip into Farewell, currently a third way through and I've probably died 400 - 500 times. I like the pufferfish and jellyfish mechanics.

I almost gave up, while C-Side 6 wasn't particularly hard, the next two put my patience to the test.

Chapter 7: C-Side is harder more so on a mechanical level, it's easy to figure what you need to do, but the execution is demanding. Over time, the movement became familiar and after around 2 hours and over 700 deaths, I'd reached the heart.

Chapter 8: C-Side proved most frustrating, clocking at a total of 3 hours and 950 deaths. This level introduces hyperdashing proper, and oh boy, I suck at it. Which isn't good especially when the level wants me to chain 4 of them in a row and later another 2 with the added pressure of rising lava. I got into a flow state where I would reach the last hyperdash tunnel, only to fail and have to repeat the whole screen. When I finally beat the level, my excitement was through the roof.

Onward to farewell now, wish me luck...

My reluctance to simply adapt to using the D-PAD proves yet again to be my bane, especially so in Chapter 5: C-Side. Wherein I repeatedly died due to dashing diagonally right-down as opposed to straight down, not something I can even fault since it's intended to played in only 8 directions with a D-PAD.

Still, I wonder how the game would feel if your dash wasn't by this constraint. Would I do better perhaps? If I were playing this on a PC, there'd probably be some mod available that let me test this, but alas I needed to spend my Nintendo gold coins that day.

Compared to the hell that was the last B-Side, Chapter 8: B-Side was significantly easier. My death count is still high of course, but overall this level felt more reasonable to accomplish. I even started popping off in some of these screens, went ultra instinct and cleared one of them first try.

Now I have do the C-Sides, and I've already made good progress on knocking each down. They're shorter but feature harder platforming, although honestly some screens are easier than stuff found in A-Side, though that might just be a result of improving. All things considered I'm dying more often in these rooms than I was in B-Side, however the length prevents the feeling of dread knowing you still have 10+ rooms to do.

This level marks the first to take over 2000 deaths to complete, I felt like throwing in the towel at so many points. I like the movement tech they introduce around the top of the summit, not too hard to get the hang of, but when required after a long series of jumps, it's stressful. Checkpoint 2 probably took over an hour to beat on its own, but the euphoria was amazing.

Finished off the rest of Reflection B-Side, totalling at 1421 deaths. Though while I did die quite a lot, this didn't feel as difficult as the previous ones, at least not during the latter portions of the level. This could probably be contributed to me simply improving, but it did seem like progress came much faster. I wish there was a way to check deaths per rooms so you could figure out where you struggled most.

Just two more B-Sides now...

'Chapter 8: Core' was a fun level, it felt strange going from the hell that was Golden Ridge B-Side, to something more manageable. Still died a lot though (440 Deaths), mainly due to not being able to work out how to control the momentum of those magma blocks you need to grab and then jump off from. Taking away dash regeneration while grounded added an interesting element of resource management.

Leaving the pleasant scorching heat and lava of Core behind, I jumped back into pain to do Reflection B-Side. I think I got a third of the way through before I had to call it a night. Like the magma blocks, I just can't seem to understand how to control the momentum from the bouncers. Dashing into them appears to always send Madeline with high velocity, but sometimes it happens seemingly arbitrarily to launch me out at full speed, not giving me the time to react behind colliding into the spiky wall. Just a #skill_issue moment I guess.

Conquered the Golden Ridge B-Side after 1000 deaths, funnily despite the over 2 week long break, I'd actually say that I was playing better than I was last time. While I'm definitely cursing at myself when playing these levels, the sense of achievement as you get further and further through a portion, and eventually clear the level is immense.

Honestly Mirror Temple B-Side was probably easier, I still died 800 times but most of that was from overcomplicating the solution. During the Theo segment of the level, I kept trying to bounce off the seeker explosion to get enough to throw him over the wall, but then I briefly watched another person play that same part and simply wall jumped instead. I'd assumed the harder method was the correct one which made things WAY harder. The 'Impossible' room wasn't even that hard compared to what came before, though perhaps I had just improved.

I'll go to the core next time, certainly think I'm more than ready at this point.

Tackled B-Sides 2 - 4, but I ended up having to take a break midway through Golden Ridge just because it was so hard. The main issue I'm having is overshooting the bubble dash and landing on spikes opposite side of the wall I'm jumping over. It's doable with some more attempts, but man; it really plucks the winds of your sails doing 3/4 of the room over and over and failing just a single jump.

I'm also cleaning up the A-Sides before doing the corresponding B-Side. Was stumped at the blue heart at Golden Ridge and needed to look up the answer. I had the right idea, but didn't crouch for long enough to fall behind the block. Going off the comments, it's supposedly a reference to some trick in Super Mario Bros 3? Pretty cool homage.

Climbing to the summit alone probably doubled my death count, but putting my frustration aside it was a great capper for the main story. Having to use all I had learnt throughout my playthrough to reach the top.

Now I'm blocked until I find enough presumably blue hearts. Thankfully, the game segments the chapters so it's fairly easy to go through and find everything I missed. Found B-Side 1 challenging, although I actually died less than I did in chapter 3 with only 340 deaths. Decided I needed to break after that and hopped off. Will return to do more later.

Already racked up over a 1000 deaths, most of which are the result me using a thumbstick as opposed to the D-Pad. I know these games are better played that way, but I just can't go against my natural reflex to move my thumb towards the stick. So far, the games pretty good, each chapter introduces a new mechanic or iterates on a previous one, so the game stays fresh. However, some chapters are also accompanied by a sort of gauntlet or chase sequence and these tend to drag. I think this because the screens are way longer so dying will force you repeat the same movements over and over (skill issue, I know). I felt this most during the goth Madeline "boss" where hitting them the first few times is simple, and then the last hit requires a bit more technicality and then I die and have to repeat the same section prior.

Overall, I am enjoying myself, can't deny the clear degree of love and passion poured into it. The Pico-8 being a great example of putting effort into something so pointless. I like how it even foreshadows the double dash ability you unlock later. My biggest worry is in regards to 100% completion since the levels are fairly long and block off backtracking at certain points, so I'll really need to heavily scrutinise every spot when redoing chapters.